Married Woman (37 page)

‘Your application, your recommendations, your NGO work, your academic record, that paper you wrote and published, your GRE scores, why else would they reply so fast?’

‘You’re biased.’

‘Not without reason, surely?’

Pipee laughed, and took the letter back, carefully folding it along the original creases, before sliding it into the browny-yellow envelope. Astha watched her.

‘When will you finally hear?’ she asked.

‘Hopefully by January.’

Maybe by January a bomb would fall on Urbana Champaign and blow the university off the face of the earth, thought Astha, but what would be the point, there would be other places. The real act of leaving was in the decision, not in the departure.

‘Maybe they won’t give me a visa‚’ Pipee broke in on the pause. ‘After all, I’m single.’

‘Yes‚’ said Astha slowly, ‘you’re single.’ How soon before she would find someone?

‘You’ve not asked me what I’m going to work on.’

‘Education of slum children, I imagine?’

‘No. The politics of communalism and how it is represented. I am more interested in that now, maybe because of what is happening around us. It might also help me come to terms with things in my life. If you realise you are not alone…’ She did not complete her sentence, and Astha felt more than ever removed from her life, from a pain so horrifying she bowed before it and shut her mouth.

‘The only trouble is there are so many aspects, all of such relevance that it is a bit hard to choose a specific area‚’ went on Pipee.

For a moment Astha felt an intense stab of envy, not just for Pipee, but for anyone who had the possibility of a new life. She had to remind herself sternly that if she wanted, she too had choices.

By the end of the year, there was plenty of material being generated for Pipee’s thesis. Kar seva had been stopped in summer on the condition that the Prime Minister solve the Babri Masjid problem in four months. Those four months were up with no solution in sight.

Thousands of kar sevaks were again being mobilised for what was termed symbolic kar seva, starting 6 December. The central government sent 135 companies of its security forces to Ayodhya and Faizabad despite the protests of the U.P. government, who claimed the law and order of their state was their responsibility.

‘This time they are not going to give up easily, they have been stopped twice before‚’ said Pipee worriedly.

‘Are you going?’ asked Astha.

‘Too much to do. I hope nothing happens.’

‘The Babri Masjid has survived almost five hundred years. Why should something happen now?’

Meanwhile Ayodhya is witnessing the unprecedented influx of thousands of kar sevaks from all over the country. Religious leaders issue press statements declaring that religion is above politics, above nation, above courts and any restraining orders passed.

By 5 December the city has swelled by 200,000 kar sevaks, and there are not enough places to put them. Schools and colleges are declared shut, while the kar sevaks storm various institutions for accommodation. The area around the masjid is littered with garbage and human excreta. Food prices go up, the U.P. government declares they have in stock 8,ooo tonnes of rice, 100 tonnes of sugar, 45,000 litres of kerosene,
as well as an ample supply of life-saving drugs.

The BJP declares that no harm will come to the masjid, the kar seva will only be symbolic.

The Union Minister sends extra paramilitary forces to Ayodhya.

7 December, Astha’s house. Headlines:
A NATION’S SHAME
there on the folded newspaper lying on the verandah, waiting to be read, digested, somehow understood.

Astha picked it up and stared at the front page. It was not possible, this could not have happened, but there it was:

A NATION’S SHAME: BABRI MASJID DEMOLISHED

Centre sacks Kalyan Singh’s Government. 500,000 kar sevaks armed with pickaxes, crowbars, pipes and uprooted barbed wire barricades, attacked the disputed site yesterday. All domes collapsed under the onslaught. Between 11.50 to 4.50 the central dome collapsed. Between 2.00 to 4.00 p.m. the two side ones were destroyed. 50 people injured. Hundreds of kar sevaks carted away bricks, pillars, and large stones. BJP leaders urged restraint through megaphones.

Angry kar sevaks singled out photographers and foreign correspondents beating some brutally with sticks and leaving them bleeding on the road.

Curfew in many U.P. towns. Muslim MPs seek the Prime Minister’s resignation. Muslim houses set ablaze. Kar sevaks not allowing fire engines in many places.

Army alerted in six states.

‘They’ve broken the mosque‚’ she found herself telling Hemant. ‘They have done it at last.’

‘I know.’

‘You know?’ Astha stared at him.

‘It was on the BBC last night.’

‘Why didn’t you tell me?’

‘What was there to say? I didn’t know you were interested.’

He was lying. She had gone to Ayodhya twice, painted the masjid at least five times, scripted a play about it, and he didn’t know she was interested? This was his revenge for being concerned in things other than him.

She turned away, sickened by everything.

‘I never knew you were such a Muslim lover‚’ said Hemant watching her. ‘Do you know what happens to our shrines in Pakistan, Bangladesh, not only to our shrines but to Hindus? Why doesn’t your precious Manch ever protest about that? Or any of your activist friends?’

‘The fact that shrines are desecrated there, doesn’t make it acceptable here. It’s not a Muslim thing, it’s a secular thing, a human thing.’

‘It’s a cowardly thing, a fool thing‚’ he said mockingly.

There was no point talking to him. Her one thought was to call Pipee, Pipee who felt like she did, with whom there would be no arguing at this moment. Quickly she dialled her number.

‘Have you heard?’

‘Yes. They’ve done it.’

‘You were right.’

‘What are we going to do?’

‘What can we do?’

Both women fell silent, their own lives dwarfed by what was happening around them.

‘Neeraj phoned. There’s a demonstration on at the BJP office, we might as well go. It must have been planned, such a thing cannot happen without careful planning.’

‘You said it was only a matter of time.’

‘It was just a thing to say. I had no idea I would be proved right so quickly.’

‘Don’t cry, sweetheart. Come to the church crossing. I’ll pick you up in half an hour.’

They talked little as they drove. As they came nearer Central Delhi they could see that the streets were lined with throngs of weeping men and women, dressed in black, faces covered. Near the BJP office, they were forced to walk, the whole area was cordoned off, lined with policemen, ready to lathi charge at any provocation.

Journalists were there, TV crew, academics and activists, all shocked and numb. They shared their information in broken sentences: paramilitary forces hand in glove with the kar sevaks – the police were helping – the leaders shouting on megaphones don’t destroy the mosque – but pre-arranged that such messages to be ignored – many killed in the falling rubble – absolute pandemonium with 500,000 kar sevaks – the situation going to worsen – the government in U.P. had no political will to protect the mosque – only a matter of time before something like this happened—

They waited for one hour, two hours. Nobody came out of the BJP office to address them. Was there anybody there? They courted arrest, were put into waiting buses, taken to the local police station, kept for half an hour and sent away.

Three days later the United Left Front organised a march to protest the demolition of the masjid.

On the morning of 10 December Astha said to her husband, ‘There is a march today.’

The husband said nothing.

Astha persisted with her information. ‘It’s going to be a tremendously big march. Traffic will be blocked around Red Fort and Connaught Place for hours. Do try and avoid those places if you wish to save yourself trouble.’

Nothing.

‘OK?’

The husband saw a female bull charging from the distance and his body tautened. He lifted a wary face and looked at his wife. Astha carefully patted the tea tray cloth.

‘I always admired your sense of proportion‚’ he said at last.

Astha raised her eyebrows and looked inquiring.

‘Out in the streets, jostling with goondas, neglecting your family, all for some fool masjid you didn’t even know existed before your great friend Aijaz chose to educate you.’

‘It has nothing to do with Aijaz‚’ said Astha, choking on the rage she had kept inside her the last three days.

‘Then his widow.’

‘I suppose I have no mind of my own.’

‘I didn’t say that.’

‘You meant it.’

‘I refuse to talk to hysterical women‚’ said Hemant, ‘especially when I have got a busy day ahead. Some people, work, you know.’ He got up and went into the bathroom, firmly closing the door.

When Astha reached the Red Fort her eyes were red with the hour-long cry she had had after Hemant left. Pipee saw her and linked her arm through hers, lacing her fingers through Astha’s own clammy hand. ‘Dearest, don’t be this upset, it’s terrible, but you can’t afford to take it so personally.’

Astha nodded dumbly. Everything in the world was terrible.

A mild winter sun shone on the gathered marchers as they stood around waiting, while truck after truck of United Front activists and associates drove in.

The line started. It was so long that by the time it was Astha’s turn, forty minutes had passed.

They marched out of the Red Fort into the middle of the road, blocking all traffic. As she walked Astha could see various people, Pipee included, handing out leaflets to onlookers, scooter wallahs, passengers in rickshaws, men scratching their balls, women holding children on their hips, women with plastic shopping baskets in their hands. Down the line the familiar slogans were shouted:
Down
with
communalism,
down
down;
BJP
down,
down;
False
followers
of
Ram,
you
will
never
succeed;
Mandir
–
masjid,
all
one.

Astha was overcome with futility. Maybe Hemant was

right. What was the use of forcing motorists, passengers and pedestrians to listen to the voice of tolerance and peace? It had not prevented anything. Maybe the true victory of fundamentalism was the total despair of the secularist.

The line reached Delhi Gate, and turned right towards the Ram Lila maidan. Down another empty street with bad-tempered traffic gathered on the other side of the divide, and then the line poured into the Ram Lila grounds, to mill around a platform erected for the speakers.

One after the other they spoke, leaders from the Congress, from the Left parties, activists who had seen what had happened in Ayodhya. They expressed anguish, regret, sorrow, they issued warnings, predicted consequences:

What had happened was a betrayal of trust. Millions of Muslims would now feel insecure in their homeland. The assurances of the U.P. government had meant nothing, the assurances of the central government had meant nothing.

The law had been blatantly, openly flouted, what was going to prevent it from being flouted again? What was going to prevent the two disputed sites in Kashi and Mathura from going the way of the Babri Masjid? Was this a government or a passive instrument in the hands of thugs? Without delay the government should acquire all the land around the Babri Masjid.

It behoved every citizen in the land to be vigilant so that anti-communal forces did not gain ascendancy. How was it possible to demolish a masjid in broad daylight in little over four hours? And that too with home-made tools, pickaxes, crowbars, the implements of farmers and peasants. No, there was organisation and planning, there was the connivance of the authorities.

Various Leaders had been arrested, but was it all for show, like the security forces that were sent to protect the Babri Masjid, and helped in its destruction?

The nation and its people demanded answers.

It was late afternoon by the time Astha left. When Hemant came home he did not ask about the rally. And Astha was only able to sleep towards morning.

After the demolition:

Nationwide, 1,801 people were murdered in communal clashes in the next two months. 226 places in 17 states and 1190.18 lakh people were affected by curfew.

In Pakistan 240 temples were targeted by mobs.

In Bangladesh attempts were made to destroy 305 temples, 1,300 houses, and 270 shops belonging to Hindus.

In the United Kingdom 18 temples and cultural centres were damaged.

In Afghanistan 4 temples were attacked.

Over the next two months major riots broke out in Bombay. 41 areas were affected, 31 per cent of the deaths were caused by the police. Pipee decided she needed to gather first-hand material.

‘Why are you going?’ asked Astha.

‘I have to go. Awful things are happening there.’

‘I know. I also read the papers‚’ said Astha irritably, ‘and that is why I wish you wouldn’t go. It’s not safe.’

Pipee looked at her for a moment, then gave a strange laugh. ‘One has to do what one has to do.’

Astha looked bewildered.

Pipee ruffled her hair with a slow unsteady hand, ‘Don’t worry, I can take care of myself.’

She came back unharmed but terribly shaken. ‘It’s worse than you realise, the police are actually firing on the innocent, making false arrests, and refusing to register complaints. How can Muslims have any security or protection when the
forces of law are among those who beat and kill? Go back to Pakistan they keep taunting, when were they ever in Pakistan, that they should go
back?
And nothing is done, nothing. What kind of country can these people feel part of? To be a Muslim here is a curse.’

‘They started it‚’ said Hemant. ‘After the Babri Masjid fell they were the ones who first took to stoning temples in Bombay. What did they expect, that this is the time of the Muslim rulers, where Hindus will sit down and not retaliate? Who set fire to the temple in Govandi? Who started throwing stones at buses, and police stations, and the BMC offices?’ 

Astha listened. If it was quite clear that there were many ways to regard what was happening, it was equally clear that she and Hemant held opposite views. Whose voice would be stronger remained to be seen.

The most effective way she had of making a statement was with paint, and she focused on that. It took her mind off her personal predicament, with such violence around her, her problems seemed small. She turned to brush and canvas to make her contribution to her country, she hoped it would be noticed. It was only a drop in a large, large ocean, but drops added up.